Gomery



U ITED STATES PATENT FFICE.

. ALPHEUS \VOODS MONTGOMERY, OF ,NElV YORK, N. Y.

PROCESS OF MANUFACTURING TARRED ROPES AND YARNS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 312,286, dated February17, 1885.

Application filed November 2, 1883. (No specimens.)

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, ALPHEUs W. MONT- GOMERY, a'citizen of the UnitedStates, resid- Yarns and ropes are tarred because the preservativequalities of the tar render them impervious to moisture and dampness andprevent decay.

The practice of my invention hereinafter de scribed causes the tar topermeate and protect more perfectly the structure and fibers of therope, while the rope itself, when coated with tar by said process, isfar more pliable in all temperatures than that manufactured by themethods at present employed;

I have discovered that the chief difficulties in the way of producing amore perfect product under the processes of tarring ropes now in usearise from the fact that the fibers of the yarns or ropes to be treatedcontain a certain amount of natural and artificial moisture, whichprevents the tar entering andthoroughly permeating all the fibers,interstices, and cells of the material; also, that said fibers andcells, when brought in contact with the tar, are in a contracted andinefficient condition, and tend to stiffen and congeal the melted tar;and, also, that the most valuable constituents of the tar for protectingthe fiber of rope or yarns and keeping them pliable, being veryvolatile, are to a large extent vaporized and lost by heating the tarbath to the temperature necessary to obtain and maintain a proper degreeof fluidity under ordinary conditions.

The hemp used in the manufacture of yarns and ropes as it is usuallyreceived in bales by rope-makers contains a certain amount of naturalmoisture. It is also usual in the process ofmanufacture to moisten ordampen the hemp before it goes to the spindles, for the purpose ofpreventing waste and insuring easy working. The conseqence of thisnatural and artificial moisture in the fiber is that when the tar isapplied it does not thoroughly permeate and saturate the fibers, whichare therefore more liable todecay than they would be if thoroughlysaturated.

The process of tarrin g yarns and ropes heretofore commonlyin use hasbeen to pass them, while in a state containing more or less natural andartificial moisture,as above described, and while at normal temperature,through a tar bath made by placing the'tar in a tank or other receptacleof a convenient size and shape, and heating it, bymeans of steam-coilsor other applications of heat, to a temperature of, say, 200 Fahrenheitand upward, the precise degree of heat employed depending somewhat uponthe condition and temperature of the surrounding atmosphere. Throughthis bath the yarns or ropes are passed by any convenient mechanism.

In this process there are the following defects: First,the presence ofmoisturein the fiber prevents the due absorption of the tar into itsstructure and fiber; second, the rope being atnormal temperature when itenters the bath tends to congeal the tar which comes in actual contacttherewith and makes it incapable of entering into thesmal-lerinterstices of the ma terial; third, heatingthe bath to thetemperature above described causes the more volatile portions of thetar, and such as more readily permeate the fiber and are mostvaluableinpreserving it, to evaporate and escape. Ropes made from yarns tarred insuch a manner lose their pliability to a great extent, and in coldweather particularly the tar in the ropes becomes hard and rubs andwears the fiber.

In the process which I have invented and for which I claim a patent Ihave avoided these defects in the following manner: I thoroughlyheat anddry the ropes or yarns before they are treated with tar, and while theyare in this heated condition I pass them through the tar bath, for thepurposes described.

By thoroughly heating and drying the yarns or ropes before they areimmersed inthe tar I expel therefrom all moisture and dampness,

and expand and distend the cells,whereby their receptivity and capacityfor absorbing the tar are greatly increased, and by passing the ropesand yarns through the tar bath while they are, in this heated conditionI am able to keep the tar'in the bath at a lower temperature than ispossible under the processes heretofore employed, whereby evaporationand waste of the most valuable constituents of the tar are avoided, andconsequently the quality of the product greatly improved. It will beobserved that, to whatever temperature the tar bath may be raised, theheated rope will absorb more tar than it would if introduced at normaltemperature, because the fibers are eX- particles of tar in actualcontact therewith,

which do not, under these conditions, lose by evaporation their morevolatile portions,being confined within the inclosing mass of coolertar. In this case the rope itself is used as a means of raising thetemperature of the tar with which it is saturated to the necessarypoint, and introducing and applying the heat in this manner is animportant feature of my invention. In other words, the tar is onlypartially heated by the application of heatto the bath as a whole, itbeing subsequently raised to the temperature necessary in rope-treatingby the heat introduced with the rope itself, whereby, as hereindescribed, improved results areefi'ected.

In the caseof yarns, the method I employ and which I prefer is to passthem, just before immersion in the tar bath, over heated cylinders. Inthe ease of ropes, alonger exposure to the action of heat maybenecessary, according to the-size of the rope, and this maybeaccomplished by placing the coil of a rope in a hot oven, or by anyother means by which it may be thoroughly dried and heated to the propertemperature immediately previous to being passed through the tar bath.

The yarns or ropes, before being passed through the tar bath, should beheated to as high a degree of temperature as is possible withoutinjuring the fiber.

In concluding this specification I desire to remark that instead ofpassing the dried rope or yarn through the tar bath while in a heatedstate I may allow the rope to cool before it is introduced therein, andstill produce a product far superior to those manufactured by theordinary processes at present employed.

I am aware that papers and felts have been heated preliminarily tocoating the surfaces thereof with wax, parafiine, varnish, and otherwaterproofing material, for the purpose of making them absorb the samemore readily; but that is not the point of my invention, the object ofwhich is to improve the rope by caus ing it to absorb the more volatileelements of the tar without heating the tar bath itself high enough todrive off the elements with which I desire to impregnate the rope, asstated in the following claim.-

What I claim as'my invention, and desire to secure by Letters'P-atent,is-

The process herein described of treating rope with tar to cause it toabsorb the more volatile portions thereof,'which process consists ofheating the tar to a temperature just high enough to render it fluid,but not high enough to expel its lighter oils, and of then introducinginto the tar bath rope raised to a temperature higher than that of thetar, to produce a tarred rope which is limber and pliable at alltemperatures, substantially as described.

. ALPIIEUS WOODS MONTGOMERY.

Vitnesses: WM. MONTGOMERY, J r., R; A. RUoKoLD.

